TORRANCE: Man goes on trial in the 1984 death of a fast-food restaurant manager.

By Denise Nix

STAFF WRITER

Just days after William Marshall allegedly killed a Torrance fast-food restaurant manager during a robbery 23 years ago, he confessed to the crime – sharing details with his then girlfriend that only the killer would know, a prosecutor said Monday.

But Marshall’s attorney countered that the former girlfriend has a history of lying to police in this case and that she also has a head injury that impedes her memory.

The opening statements in the “cold case” trial were the first public glimpse into the details of the Oct. 30, 1984, murder of Robin Hoynes at the Kentucky Fried Chicken, which was at Palos Verdes Boulevard just south of Pacific Coast Highway.

Marshall, 46, a former state Department of Forestry captain, was an immediate suspect in Hoynes’ death but wasn’t arrested until 2005, after investigators reopened the case.

A grand jury indicted Marshall on a murder charge and the special circumstance allegation of killing during a robbery. If convicted at the trial, which is expected to last about a month, he faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.

In his two-hour opening statement, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin discussed the circumstantial evidence he said proved that only one person – Marshall – could have killed 21-year-old Hoynes.

A key witness in the case will be Marshall’s former girlfriend, Yvonne Williams, who initially did not reveal much new information when contacted in 2005. Later, however, she told detectives she lied about an alibi she provided for Marshall two decades before, and she shared details, which she said Marshall gave her, of the killing.

Hoynes was working late doing paperwork after the franchise closed when she was killed.

A medical examiner is expected to testify that she had two fatal wounds in her back and that her throat was slashed – information not released to the public.

Blood spots near the restaurant’s safe linked to Hoynes showed that whoever killed her stabbed her before trying to open the safe, Lewin said. Also, she had no defensive wounds, indicating she did not know she was about to be attacked, he added.

Along with evidence that there were no signs of a forced entry, investigators concluded that she knew her attacker and did not fear him.

Marshall was fired from his assistant manager job at the restaurant about four days before Hoynes’ death. Among other things, Lewin said, Marshall was suspected of stealing from the restaurant. The prosecutor said evidence will also show that he had a drug problem.

In a taped statement, Williams told a detective she asked Marshall about the crime during a conversation in her car.

She said Marshall told her that he asked the female manager for the money but that she wouldn’t give it to him – and instead dropped the envelope with the cash receipts for the day into the safe’s drop slot.

Marshall told Williams that he didn’t know if she was dead after he stabbed her but that he slashed her throat to keep her from talking and identifying him, Williams said in the statement.

She said he cried and worried that, because of what he had done, he wasn’t going to get into heaven.

“That was a confession,” Lewin said. “But he didn’t give you the whole story.”

Lewin said Hoynes likely put the money in the safe when he arrived, and Marshall, upon learning that the combination to the safe had changed since his termination, attacked her from behind.

“He modified his story so he didn’t look quite as bad, although it’s still horrific,” Lewin said.

The press had reported that the perpetrator got away with money – so only the killer would know that he didn’t, Lewin noted.

In addition, Williams told the detective that an object found at the crime scene – later identified as a piece of foam – came from Marshall’s shoe.

She said she told Marshall that the police showed her a picture of the object within days of the crime. Marshall told her it came from his boots, and tore out the matching foam piece from the heel of his other boot and threw it out of the car as they drove on a freeway.

Lewin said the foam piece recovered at the restaurant was analyzed by a shoe expert and a chemist at the FBI, and they will testify that it is consistent with the boots Marshall was wearing when arrested on Nov. 10, 2005. That arrest came after detectives placed Marshall under surveillance for five days.

They followed him as he left Williams’ South Los Angeles home and drove to Fountain Valley, all the while using what Lewin termed were “evasive” driving tactics – changing speeds and pulling over, as if trying to lose someone.

Officers followed Marshall, who wore gloves and camouflage pants, as he cased a Fountain Valley Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant where he had previously worked. He repeatedly left and returned, looking in the windows and watching the employee door.

Eventually, he was arrested. Inside the car with him was his “robbery and murder kit,” Lewin said, describing the contents of a blue nylon bag that contained a boning knife.

Lewin said a tool expert will testify that the knife is consistent with the weapon Hoynes was stabbed with.

Marshall’s defense attorney, Simon Aval, said one of the wounds on Hoynes’ back was 9 inches long, and said the blade of the knife found in Marshall’s bag was less than 6 inches long.

He told the jury there was no evidence – with all the blood and forensic samples collected and technology now available to test it – to link Marshall to Hoynes’ murder.

Aval also said the jury will hear that the foam was “chemically different” from the boot Marshall wore at the time of his arrest.

“There is no doubt Ms. Robin Hoynes was stabbed and killed,” Aval said. “The only dispute really is what happened and who committed the crime itself.”

The first witness to testify was Hoynes’ younger sister, Wendy Castaneda. She described her sister as her “best friend,” a “very maternal” woman whom she shared a room with in their family home in Whittier.

To show that Hoynes likely knew her attacker, Lewin asked Castaneda about Hoynes’ habits regarding safety.

Castaneda said she locked doors and kept close contact with her family.

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